


The Truth Will Break Your Heart

by starfishstar



Series: Brothers, Bitter and Sweet [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Comfort, Gen, Grief, Holmes Brothers, Holmes Family, Kidlock, Mycroft is the best big brother, Sherlock and Mycroft as kids, discussion of death of a beloved pet, discussion of putting a pet to sleep, inspired by Three Patch Podcast, yes stories of Mycroft worrying over Sherlock are apparently my thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-05
Updated: 2015-05-05
Packaged: 2018-03-28 22:51:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3872725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starfishstar/pseuds/starfishstar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock had been too intelligent for well-intentioned lies for years now. Mycroft realised he would have to be told the truth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Truth Will Break Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

> Another story inspired by the musings of those lovely folks over at the Three Patch Podcast – in this case, [Shannon](http://penns-woods.tumblr.com/), [Roane](http://tumblr.selkie.net/) and [Caroline](http://avawatson.tumblr.com/) in the Sorting Redbeard segment of [Episode 35: The Bitter Brother](http://www.three-patch.com/2015/04/01/episode-35-the-bitter-brother/).

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Sherlock,” Mycroft snapped, his patience giving up its last tenuous hold. “Do stop it, please.”  
   
Sherlock continued to shriek at piercing pitch and extraordinary volume, his arms clamped around Redbeard’s shaggy auburn neck, his body huddled protectively against the dog on the wooden floor of the living room. The only change in his behaviour was that he swivelled his head up and around to fix Mycroft with a furious glare.  
   
Mycroft planted his feet more firmly and crossed his arms. Yes, how very lucky for him that this was happening during his spring half-term holiday, when he was here at home instead of at school, thus allowing Mummy and Daddy to throw Mycroft to the wolves in their stead.  
   
The wolves being Sherlock, of course. He was the only one here feral enough to deserve that epithet. Redbeard, patiently enduring Sherlock’s death grip, was by far the better behaved of the two.  
   
“SHERLOCK,” Mycroft said, then regretted having raised his voice. Attempts at force got one nowhere with Sherlock.  
   
Sherlock’s baleful eyes, still fixed on Mycroft, were dark with accusation.  
   
_Redbeard is going to a lovely farm in the countryside, sweetpea, where he can enjoy a nice retirement_ , Mummy had said. _Don’t you think that will be the best thing for a sweet old dog like Redbeard?_  
   
Mummy, for all her mathematical brilliance, was woefully untutored in the language of Sherlock. A child Sherlock might be, but he’d been too intelligent for well-intentioned lies for years now.  
   
“Sherlock,” Mycroft said, forming each syllable clearly with his lips so that Sherlock would be able to discern Mycroft’ words despite the cacophony of his own shrieking. “I will tell you the truth, I promise. But you must stop that abominable noise so you can hear me.”  
   
Sherlock was clearly considering Mycroft’s words, but he carried on shrieking while he deliberated, just in case. Mycroft felt a headache coming on. Oh, to be back in the dormitory with half a dozen horrid, uncouth, bullying adolescent louts. Infinitely easier to manage than one primary-school-aged child too perceptive for his own good.  
   
Finally, Sherlock stopped screaming. The room seemed to ring in the sudden, eerie silence. Mycroft took an involuntary half-step backwards.  
   
“I won’t let Mummy and Daddy take Redbeard away,” Sherlock declared, his voice trying to sound fierce, though it was ragged from all the yelling. “He’s my best friend. He stays here with me.”  
   
As if intuiting that he was the subject of their conversation, Redbeard turned his long, regal head and licked a sloppy stripe up Sherlock’s face. Sherlock grinned, all cares momentarily forgotten, and whispered something into the dog’s ear, too quietly for Mycroft to hear.  
   
They had had Redbeard nearly as long as Mycroft could remember, which meant in consequence that the dog had attained a dignified middle age even before Sherlock came along, and was a venerably aged gentleman now. Mummy and Daddy had tried to prod Mycroft, in early childhood, into adoring Redbeard, playing with Redbeard, running about the garden with Redbeard, all those things that children were meant to do with their pets. They seemed to think such a bond would provide needed socialisation for their serious, self-contained son.  
   
Mycroft had not deigned to accept this conventional wisdom, that he ought to form an attachment with the dog simply because the dog was there. At five, six, seven years old, Mycroft had prided himself on being far more rational than that.  
   
And then his baby brother had arrived, helpless and squalling and red in the face with his frustration at the world, and Mycroft had never again been wholly rational.  
   
Mycroft crouched down, feeling, as always, large and ungainly beside his small brother. He was close enough that he could easily have reached out and placed an arm around Sherlock, but he didn’t dare try it.  
   
Instead, he observed his brother minutely, noting his flushed cheeks, the perspiration on his forehead, his fingers locked tightly in Redbeard’s long fur. Sherlock would scream himself into catatonia if Mycroft let him go on. And he would go on for as long as he thought Redbeard was being taken away from him and there still might be something he could do to stop it.  
   
He would have to be told the truth.  
   
Unlike Mycroft, Sherlock had adored Redbeard instantly, crawling clumsily along in the dog’s wake, pulling himself up against Redbeard’s shaggy flank long before he could walk on his own. Once upon a time, Mummy and Daddy had referred to Redbeard as “Mycroft’s dog.” Then, later, it was “the boys’ dog,” and eventually, without either of them seeming to notice the subtle sea change, they only ever said “Sherlock’s dog.”  
   
Mycroft had let it go without comment. Redbeard had never been his.  
   
When Mycroft thought back over their shared childhood, his and Sherlock’s, these were the images that came most readily to his mind’s eye: the boy and the dog tumbling in the grass of the back garden, Sherlock’s dark curls flying, Redbeard panting and grinning a canine grin. Sherlock hanging from the lowest branches of the ash tree, shouting that he was the Dread Pirate William Scott of the High Seas, and attempting to balance a sailor’s hat precariously atop Redbeard’s head. Sherlock steely-eyed and intent, investigating some small find beneath the bushes along the side of the house whilst Redbeard sat upright on his haunches, keeping watch over his small master with a dog’s unswerving loyalty. The only creature that accepted Sherlock unconditionally, exactly as he was.  
   
Mycroft settled down cross-legged on the floorboards beside Sherlock and Redbeard, close to his brother, but not touching him. “Sherlock,” he said, using his most calming voice. “Redbeard is very old. You know that. And when Mummy and Daddy took him to the vet yesterday, they found out he’s sick as well. That’s why he hasn’t been eating.”  
   
Sherlock nodded, not looking at Mycroft, burying his face in Redbeard’s neck instead.  
   
Mycroft pushed on, wishing he were anywhere else. Or any _one_ else. Anyone who wouldn’t be so devastated by the hurt he was about to inflict on his brother. “Redbeard is going to die, Sherlock. That’s simply a fact. If you let him go on as he is, in pain and not eating, he’s going to get weaker and weaker, maybe for weeks, suffering. You’ll have to watch him suffering.” Mycroft paused to let the lump that was rising in his throat settle, and hoped Sherlock wouldn’t notice. “Or you can go with Mummy and Daddy and take him to the vet, today. You can hold him and pet him and tell him what a good dog he is, so he isn’t scared. And the vet will give him a shot, and it will be just like falling asleep. It’s up to you, Sherlock, but one way or another, Redbeard has to leave you.”  
   
_He was always going to leave you. So don’t get attached like this again, baby brother._  
   
Sherlock raised his head from Redbeard’s fur, his face gone pale. He repeated the only part of Mycroft’s verbiage that mattered. “Redbeard has to die.”  
   
It wasn’t a question. Sherlock didn’t ask questions when he already knew the answer.  
   
“I know his loss will break your heart,” Mycroft said quietly.  
   
Sherlock shook his head energetically, as if his own heart weren’t what mattered here. His eyes burned in his white face, but he didn’t return to his screaming.  
   
“I’m sorry,” Mycroft said.  
   
As he observed his brother, a number of thoughts flicked through Mycroft’s mind, competing for space – how very young Sherlock was, how alone he would feel with Redbeard no longer constantly at his side. And how much of Sherlock’s life stretched ahead of him in the same way, young and feeling alone. But Mycroft dismissed these thoughts as maudlin and thus ultimately of no use, and tried instead to fathom what, if anything, might do his brother any good in this particular moment. Mycroft himself wouldn’t have required anything, but then, Mycroft wouldn’t have allowed himself this attachment to Redbeard.  
   
He hesitated. Then, moving very slowly, signalling his intentions all the way, Mycroft leaned in towards Sherlock, who was still clamped around Redbeard, and wrapped his arms around his brother.  
   
The gesture felt stiff and unfamiliar. Mycroft’s arms were unpractised in the movement, and Sherlock remained rigid and unyielding within them. For a long, excruciating moment, Mycroft wondered if it might not be too late to withdraw and pretend he had not meant to do that at all. There was only one creature in the world whose comfort Sherlock wanted, and that was the one already locked in Sherlock’s arms, breathing his doggy breath into Sherlock’s curls. Mycroft, with his awkward elbows and his ungainly girth and his preference for cool, tidy facts over messy human beings could not hope to replicate that affection.  
   
But then, suddenly, impossibly, Sherlock’s angry body went limp. He bowed his head over Redbeard’s neck and flopped gracelessly down into the circle of Mycroft’s arms, breathing in short, angry gasps against the dog’s fur. Crying, Mycroft realised, utterly at a loss. Sherlock was crying.  
   
Mycroft shifted unsuccessfully against the hard wood of the floor. The angle at which he was seated and the added weight of Sherlock had combined to cut off circulation in Mycroft’s right leg, and his calf was going slowly numb.  
   
But Sherlock continued to gasp, almost silently, into Redbeard’s fur. So Mycroft stayed, sitting lopsidedly on the floor with his arms around his brother, ignoring the pins and needles in his leg. And Sherlock, limp and wordless, held tight to Redbeard, and allowed himself to be held.


End file.
